I like Sundays–most of the time. I like our morning worship time. God always seems to be active in ways I don’t expect or could not anticipate. Sometimes it is apparent–sometimes not. Sometimes I will preach a message that just seems to connect. Sometimes I will preach a message that seems to fall flat. Yet, I have learned that God is not empowered by the former or limited by latter. He does what he does.
Then there are the other moments:
1. "Norman"–the man in the wheel chair who is bound almost expressionless by his body. The last few weeks, he had uttered a few words. Yesterday he said, "A Good Day." Those words were encouraging, as saw the physical effort that it took to speak.
2. Yesterday, I had seven children (7 years old) on the podium to help me with an illustration of something that I was trying to communicate. I had placed seven can’s of vegetables etc. on one of the the front pews. In the middle of the sermon, I asked for them to come to the podium, stopping by the front row to pick up a can. While they were doing this, I was talking, setting up the illustration. Now they were all on the podium. I looked at each child and several of the girls had nothing in their hands. Why? Because the boys had picked up two cans. So–I had to "redistribute." I then looked at each child and one little girl still had nothing in her hand. Then I saw it, one of the twin girls was holding a can behind her back (meaning she had two). Time for another "redistribution."
That was yesterday morning. Things got more troubling that evening…
We had seventy people out yesterday morning. All were at Winterfest, a wonderful gathering of thousands teens from a number of states. We looked forward to Jamie coming home that afternoon. Our group came home but then we got word that another group from the Highland church had an accident (on their way home). One boy died, while a number of the other kids were injured. The boy who died was related to a very fine family in our church. Among the injured was my friend Mike Cope’s son Chris, who was flown to a hospital in Fort Worth. I prayed for them just a few moments ago, imaging Mike in a hospital room anxious about his son. Pretty sobering….